Where is the problem likely to be?

Should I assume that these signals are all digital?

You don't say if the distorted sound is only from the antenna, the DVD player or both. If one, but not the other, then that points you to the problem. If both, that points in another direction.

If the problem is when using any source, I would suspect the multiple splitters. This is easy enough to test. A kitchen TV should be portable enough that you can take it to the room with the other TV and connect it to the cable feeding the TV that works well. If the kitchen TV works ok on the other feed, then the problem is the feed to the kitchen TV.

Why do you have so many splitters? Each 2 way splitter takes 3 dB from the signal and 4 way splitters take 6 dB from the signal. It doesn't matter if there is anything connected to the extra outputs.

Since this is a problem that developed over time, the signal strength may be marginal, but enough, except that there is a bit of corrosion on a connection or even inside a splitter.

I would replace any unneeded splitters with straight through connectors and see if the kitchen TV works ok.

Hi Micky,

The TV. Try moving it to the other location to check.

If there were a problem with the cable or splitter amp, you would be seeing picture and sound disturbances possibly also on other outlets.

Kitchen TV? Why?

Move it to another place and see.

maybe it's a massive crt set puttied into a big hole in the wall. There must be some reason he hasn't checked that already.

Why not? Watch the news while eating breakfast for starters. Have the ball game on while cooking. You can even buy a refrigerator with one built in.

I see fancy brochures for 40ish megabuck houses on the lake with a giant flat-screen TV on the wall in every room.

If you're always watching TV, you can do that in any cheap dump.

I find it hard to believe that a 20 year old TV will work at all on modern digital TV signals without a set top box interposed somewhere.

My money for distorted audio would be on the audio amplifier circuit in the set. Electrolytic capacitors seldom last more than a couple of decades without degrading to some extent.

Signal related problems on digital are generally of the all or nothing type due to the error correction and the image usually breaks up first. Audio tends to get short gaps in and/or ultrasonic clicks depending on the sophistication of the decoder (better ones mute bad blocks, crude ones generate intense high frequency pulses instead).

I find it useful to have a small TV I can move around to check things. That could quickly locate your problem.

If the kitchen TV is digital, it can't have distorted sound due to the RF, unless there's bad video as well. If the item is 39 years old, it is analog and RF connection to 'central location' is certainly a suspect. If you have a second TV and a suitable F-connector attenuator box, you can swap in a known-good TV to see if that fixes the sound, AND flipping a few dB of attenuation into the RF can determine if you're near the noise floor with the wiring and splitters.

Could just be a warped speaker cone; cooking steam and paper structure...

Or it might not find it at all. With the symptoms being described, one set may be more sensitive than another if it is a signal problem.

How much does a small TV cost these days? They have to be pretty cheap.